Why can't I link BCM with SBA?

J

JKHarner

HELP! I have Office Professional 2003. I installed Small Business Accounting
2006. Things were going along okay (except I really don't like the interface
of SBA and I miss some Quickbooks features, anyway not important!) I read in
the SBA users guide that you can connect Outlook and SBA with this cool
little tool call Business Contact Manager.

First mistake: I believed the pitch.
Second mistake: I installed BCM.

Well, it made Outlook crash, shutdown, restart, crash, shutdown .. you get
the idea.
Anyway, I have Outlook and SBA stablized now. However, I still cannot figure
out how to link BCM with SBA. After searching the KB on BCM the article makes
it sound like it is two clicks of a button, but I can find the "Link to
Accounting" option anywhere.
 
J

JKHarner

Chris:

Thanks for the reply. Unfortunately, I can see the Business Tools menu but I
can't see Accounting Tools (and obviously anything beneath that root.).

I also asked for your help on a post in SBA. You responded to someone that
has the exact same issue as I do.
 
L

Luther

What version of BCM do you have?
Chris:

Thanks for the reply. Unfortunately, I can see the Business Tools menu but I
can't see Accounting Tools (and obviously anything beneath that root.).

I also asked for your help on a post in SBA. You responded to someone that
has the exact same issue as I do.
Click to expand...
 
J

JKHarner

Okay, I'm done! Here is the process I went through, UNSUCCESSFULLY, to fix
this issue:

1. Uninstall BCM
2. Uninstall BC for Pocket PC
3. Uninstall SBA
4. Uninstall SQL Server Desktop Engine

This should have given me a blank slate to work from. There were other
instructions listed in Article 897877 to completely remove SBA and MSDE.
However, the article states:

"Warning. Serious problems might occur if you modify the registry
incorrectly by using Registry Editor or by using another method. These
problems might require that you reinstall your operating system. Microsoft
cannot guarantee that these problems can be solved. Modify the registry at
your own risk."

I was not willing to go through the brain damage of modifying the registry,
just to create more problems and have MS say "Too bad!" So, I skipped this
step and:

1. Reboot
2. Installed BCM
2. Installed BC for Pocket PC
3. Installed SBA
4. Installed BCM & SBA SP2

It still didn't work! So, I am done with trying to fix this issue. It has
taken a week out of my time that I could have spent with clients - which is
what my business gets paid for. None of my clients are care that I have had
technical problems, they just want their work done. And they are right! So, I
will let MS deal with this issue and I will go back to using Outlook without
BCM and go back to using Quickbooks.

However, here are my suggestions to MS for whatever they are worth:

BCM is not a stand-alone program, it is an add-in to MS Outlook. So any
service patch that relates to BCM should be linked to an MS Outlook service
patch and NEVER linked to SBA. Based on what I have read there are some real
issues with MSDE not being fully uninstalled. MS should never expect any of
their clients to manually fix the system registry and then warn them that
they will not support any issue created by following their instructions.

I have seriously been looking at installing Small Business Server 2003.
However, this too is on hold. As the President of my own company, I cannot
afford, and will never allow again, to have the day-to-day operations of my
business put on hold because of Microsofts inability to make, distribute and
support quality products.

I applaud Microsofts efforts to create viable solutions for small
businesses. However, it appears to me that they need to fully understand the
impact that releasing less than quality products has on small businesses and
integrate that understanding into their release schedules. I would rather
wait for a quality product that works than install a less-than-stable product
and run around trying to fix the mess that it causes.

Jonathan
 
J

JKHarner

Chris:

Thanks for the info. Here is what I found out:

SBA did not create a .SBC file for my company database. I am going to try to
create the text file myself - I will let you know what happens.

Jonathan
 
J

JKHarner

Nothing I did worked. I ended up calling MS technical support. They fix the
issue via RA. So now, Outlook works, BCM works and SBA doesn't. However, that
is okay because I wasn't thrilled with SBA anyway.

What amazed me was that it took an MS technical support person about three
hours to fix my computer. She had to uninstall SBA, BCM and other software on
my system to get it to work. She also had to modify the Microft Windows
registry. Watching her work, this is not something that even a computer savvy
individual could do.

I still cannot believe the problems that BCM caused.
 

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